


learned behaviors

by goingmywaydoll



Series: you and me [1]
Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: (but not a character we know), Family Dynamics, Family Member Death, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Married Life, One Shot, Post-Canon, Wakes & Funerals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-27
Updated: 2019-07-27
Packaged: 2020-07-20 12:24:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19992166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goingmywaydoll/pseuds/goingmywaydoll
Summary: Brewers don't like to be taken care of. David tries anyway.





	learned behaviors

**Author's Note:**

> there are approximately a million other things i should be working on and yet. here this is. thank you, as always, to aly for humoring my worst, most emotional impulses.
> 
> part one in a series about aging, growing old together, and married life. most of it was written months ago, it's just a matter of editing.

There are Brewers everywhere, in every room of the house. He didn’t know Patrick’s grandma, hadn’t ever met her except for once at the wedding. He had known they were close, picked out bits and pieces from the family histories Patrick slowly peeled back over the years. But it had been through Marcy that he learned why Patrick didn’t visit—too confusing for her with the dementia so advanced, she had told him over a cup of tea in her kitchen—and through Marcy that he learned she was getting worse. 

Patrick had driven down the day before she died, leaving David to take care of the store. They were past the point where one of them had to be there all the time, maybe could have even gotten away with closing it for the day, but Patrick had just packed a bag and told David he’d be back when she got better. David knew the books, knew that they could have left Marcia, the new sales associate in charge, knew that Patrick knew he knew all that. He let him go anyway, let him get on the bus so David could have the car, let him stay quiet about it. He wouldn’t push, not with something like this.

He called David after midnight the next night to tell him she died. They talked for an hour before he said, “I think I want you to come down here.”

David had been putting his overnight bag in the trunk of the car when he said it.

So he’s standing in the Brewers’ living room, in a house full of other Brewers and family friends—some of them recognizable from the wedding, others completely, utterly unfamiliar, dressed in all in black and telling stories about people he doesn’t know. Marcy won’t stop moving, bobbing between the living room and the kitchen, making sure everyone has water and food and everything they need. 

“She needs to feel needed, I think,” Patrick had said the night before, when she had come into their room to ask if they needed anything. He said it quiet, like it was a secret, curled on his side in the queen-sized bed in the guest room that used to be his bedroom. David thinks about how sometimes Patrick disappears into the kitchen when the Roses are over for dinner, cleans up, hides smiles, exchanges looks with David, and he gets it. 

Patrick is on the couch now, holding a plate of food he’s barely touched. One of his nieces is leaning against his legs, picking at her own plate. He’s talking lowly to her, too softly for David to hear from his spot in the door to the kitchen. Her eyes are red and puffy and the same color as Patrick’s; Patrick didn’t cry except for at the funeral and in the kitchen with his mom that morning. He looks up, as if he can tell David has been watching him, and manages a weak smile. David tries to return it but mouths _I love you_ instead. Patrick’s jaw tightens, lips pressed in a line. _Love you too_ , he mouths back and David rolls his eyes, ignoring the tears welling up. 

He ducks back into the kitchen before Patrick can see and sinks his hands into soapy water. He can’t talk to Brewers right now, can’t share their grief, but he can do dishes. He collects the discarded ones from the dining room, starts putting away things from the buffet in tupperware. He can see Clint through the window over the sink with some of Patrick’s nieces and nephews, throwing a baseball around. 

By the time Marcy finds him, he’s done half of the dishes he could find, the pads of his fingers wrinkled from the hot water.

“Oh. I didn’t expect anyone to be in here.” Her voice is soft by the door and he turns. She has one hand against the doorframe, like it’s the only thing keeping her up. She looks like Patrick, eyes red around the edges from crying that morning, a distant memory, cleaned up before having to entertain the whole family after the funeral. 

“I’m sorry, I just thought—I wanted to help,” he says uselessly. Patrick had said she liked being needed and he’s taken a job away from her. He sets the half-washed dish in his hand down in the sink, wiping his hands on a dishtowel. 

Marcy pushes herself off the wall, walks across the room and pulls David into a hug. He’s surprised, stiff in her arms, and she immediately pulls back. “I’m sorry, I just…Well, I wanted to say thank you.”

Marcy had hugged him on their wedding day, and David thinks that might be the only other time she has. She hugs Patrick a lot, ran across the front lawn when they visited the first time and threw her arms around his neck as if he weren’t taller than her, as if he was as little as he used to be. Patrick had collapsed into it, arms tight around her, face buried in her shoulder. 

“It’s okay. You can like, hug me, if you want.” It comes out more like a nervous laugh, which feels wildly inappropriate, but Marcy doesn’t seem to mind.

She’s looking at him a little like she can’t believe he’s standing in her kitchen. “Thank you, David,” she says finally, the words sounding thick and soft against her tongue.

“For what?” 

Marcy smiles, looking a little like she doesn’t get how David could be so oblivious. “You’re doing a very good job taking care of Patrick,” she says, turning and glancing through the open door into the living room to where she can see Patrick now sitting on the floor playing cards with his niece. “It isn’t easy.”

“Am I?” he asks before he can stop himself. “I don’t feel like I am.”

Again, Marcy looks at him like he’s being ridiculous. “I suppose that makes sense,” she says, confusing him even more. He tilts his head to the side, so she elaborates, looking back to Patrick. “You’re probably used to taking care of him. It makes a certain kind of sense that you aren’t as familiar with a Patrick who refuses to be taken care of, who doesn’t take care of himself.”

David snorts, then blushes red. “Sorry, I just—I mean, you’re right. That’s why I laughed. I have seen him refusing care, I just…Well, I never talked about it with anyone but him, so it’s nice to know I’m not a _completely_ unreasonable asking him to just go to sleep so he doesn’t collapse at work the next day.”

Marcy lets out a laugh too. “We had to take away his mitt one day in high school because he would practice in the backyard with Will so late that the deck light would keep us up,” she tells him, shaking her head. 

“Did you know one time I ‘accidentally’ turned off our wifi so he would stop working past midnight one night?”

“Oh, I should try that with Clint,” she says. Her eyes look a little brighter as they talk and it fills David with something warm. The whole house feels so heavy, but not so much anymore. “He’s always been so focused,” she says, watching Patrick again. “Ever since he was a little boy, it was always about the task at hand. And then, when he got older, it was never about himself. But today, I’m not sure…it feels a little like things are about him today. In a good way, of course.”

David follows her gaze, watches as Patrick gives his niece a high five. 

“You know, when his grandpa died, Patrick spent the whole day in the kitchen with me. Clint had to lock the door and clean the rest so that we wouldn’t. And then Patrick just cleaned the rest of the house. I think I snapped at him about it, told him to go lie down. He told me my dad had died and it didn’t matter what he was doing. I think he forgot that he was allowed to grieve his grandpa as much as I was allowed to grieve my dad.” He can hear Marcy’s words stick in her throat as they watch Patrick show his niece how to shuffle the cards neatly. “It’s different, this time, I think.” She pauses, looking back at David. “He’s not in the kitchen, first of all.”

David crosses his arms over his chest, looking anywhere but Marcy. 

“Why don’t you give yourself a break, sweetheart?” she says, patting his arm. “Go spend time with him.” She goes on tiptoes to kiss his cheek, offering a smile before taking out a tray of food. He just barely catches her calling into the living room, “Would anyone like more carrots?”

Patrick is still playing cards, so immersed in the game that David can’t tell if he’s faking the enthusiasm or not. He goes back to the sink, turning the water to hot, and keeps doing the dishes. His back starts to ache, his neck growing sore, so he straightens, rolling his head around until it goes away. He might need a hot compress tonight, might need to ask Patrick to trade back massages, a new nightly routine since Patrick’s back pain got worse.

The next time he’s interrupted, it’s by Patrick, arms winding around his waist from behind, kissing the back of his neck. David jumps at the touch, almost dropping the cup in his hand. “Hey.” Patrick’s voice is quiet in his ear. “How are you doing?”

“How am _I_ doing?” David asks, continuing to wash the cup in his hand. “Shouldn’t I be asking you that question?”

“I’m doing okay, how are you doing?” Patrick answers quickly, resting the side of his head against David’s back.

“I’m fine, care to elaborate?” he shoots back. Patrick tightens his arms around David briefly. 

“I’m thinking it’s sweet you’ve been here all afternoon doing the dishes,” Patrick says finally. “I’m thinking I’m grateful to be married to you. I’m thinking you’re really good at taking care of people. Does that answer your question?”

It doesn’t but Patrick buried his grandma today, so David doesn’t push it. “I just wanted to help,” he says instead, setting the dish down. He turns around in Patrick’s arms, looping his arms around his neck. “I couldn’t be in there, with all of your family. It felt…heavy and private and like I was intruding—”

“Hey, you’re never intruding,” Patrick says and David fixes him with a look. “Sorry,” he says, looking sheepish before closing his mouth.

“I wanted to do something for you. And your parents. I can’t—I’m not _like_ you, I’m not good at taking care of people, I don’t know what to do with myself here, and this is _big_ , and I have to do _something_. So I’m doing the dishes.” He lifts his shoulders and lets them fall, looking around so he doesn’t have to look at Patrick.

“Hey.” Patrick’s voice is soft again, low and gravelly. “What are you talking about?”

“What do you mean, I’m—”

“No, really, David, you’ve been so good today,” Patrick says before he can finish, pulling David closer. “You’ve been perfect. Everyone’s said so, you know. You’re always a hit at these things. I think they like you better than me at this point.”

“That’s not true.” He knows it isn’t, knows there are some Brewers he just can’t interact with, hasn’t figured out how to. 

“It’s mostly true.” Patrick is rubbing soothing circles down his lower back as he talks, looking focused and sure, like he wants to make sure David gets it. “You know, when I was playing cards with Lucy, she asked if she could play with you.”

“You’re lying,” says David and feels Patrick laugh against him, shoulders shaking.

“I’m not,” he says, emphatic. “She said I liked winning too much.”

“Aren’t you supposed to like, let kids win?”

“Sometimes,” Patrick says and he’s tracing shapes along David’s back again, slow and absent-minded. “Got to humble them other times.”

“You’re just competitive.”

“Says the guy who kicked Stevie from our house last time we played monopoly.”

“She and Alexis were teaming up, which is _not_ how you play.”

“David, there’s nothing in the rules that say people can’t ally.”

“It’s _unspoken_. It’s not fair.”

Patrick bites back his smile and tilts his head to the side. “Okay, David,” he says finally, in a way that says _We both know you’re being ridiculous but I don’t feel like goading you anymore, so let’s change the subject, please, before you get_ really _ridiculous._

He starts to knead at the knots in Patrick’s shoulders. He’s been tense for days, shoulders always a straight line, never relaxed until he crawls into bed. There are mornings here, when he wakes, laying on his side, where his body forgets it’s supposed to be stressed, soft and folded around David’s. And then he wakes properly, doesn’t linger in bed, getting up and dressed, and is down in the kitchen helping his dad with breakfast before David even has the chance to find his outfit for the day. They go home tomorrow, have to leave early to open the store, and David thinks it might get worse—having to care for his mom from afar, care for the store and make sure their house doesn’t fall apart. 

So David massages his shoulders and lets Patrick’s head loll to the side, eyes fall shut, and plans out his week of doing chores around the house and the store, just enough that Patrick can keep busy, just enough that he won’t overwork himself. There’s no way Patrick won’t notice, no way he won’t try to convince David he needs the work.

“You take such good care of me. It’s like I don’t even notice it’s happening and suddenly a weight is gone. And it’s because of you.” Patrick’s jaw ticks when he finishes but his eyes are resolutely trained on David.

He leans down and kisses Patrick soundly because he can’t think of what to say to that, because Patrick is looking at him with those wide, earnest eyes, begging David to get it. When he pulls away, Patrick looks dazed. “Thank you,” David says softly. “For saying that.”

“Well, I meant it,” he replies easily, tugging David closer into a hug. “I always mean it, David.”

That makes David’s eyes sting and he closes them tightly. “I know,” he says, just above a whisper. “I know.”

“Thank you,” Patrick says into his neck, breath brushing against his skin and David knows that he isn’t thanking him for understanding. David can feel the flutter of Patrick’s eyelashes against his skin, knows Patrick has closed his eyes, holding David tighter. He feels Patrick’s muscles release the tension under his touch and he pulls him even closer until Patrick fully relaxes against him. Patrick leans on him there in the kitchen of his childhood and teen years, nearly falling asleep standing up. David keeps his eye on the door, making sure to wave everyone who tries to come in the door away. 

The only person he doesn’t wave away is Marcy, holding a tray of dirty dishes. She pauses in the doorway, shoulders sagging as she catches sight of them. David doesn’t need to say anything at all for her to set the tray down silently and leave the room. Moments later, his phone buzzes. He extracts it from his pocket, careful not to jostle Patrick.

_Marcy Brewer (8:49 pm): If you go through the pantry, you’ll be able to sneak him upstairs without anyone seeing ;)_

He nudges Patrick, who squints in the light of the kitchen and blinks slowly. He’s close to falling asleep on his feet which, David thinks with a pang, is likely because he hasn’t slept properly in days. So David unwraps his arms from around him and laces their fingers together, dragging him through the pantry and down the hall to the stairs.

“How did you know?” Patrick asks him lowly as they walk up the stairs.

“Your mom told me.” David throws a glance over his shoulder to catch Patrick’s reaction. His expression slips into something soft, appreciative; there’s a touch of surprise behind it too, only noticeable because David knows the lines of his face so well. 

“Can’t believe you’re teaming up with my mom to get me to take a nap,” Patrick mutters as David pushes him toward the bed. Patrick sits heavily on it, shoulders slumped, watching as David kneels and starts unlacing his shoes. “I can take off my own shoes, David.”

“Funnily enough, I _am_ aware of that,” David says, sending him a look. 

“Are you going to undress me too? Help me get my pajamas on?”

“I would,” David muses, “If you’d _let_ me.”

Patrick laughs, shaking his head and kicking off his shoes as David pushes himself to his feet, walking to the cabinet that Patrick has emptied his suitcase into to get his pajamas. David makes a move to help Patrick take off his shirt, mostly to screw with him, but Patrick swerves away, grabbing the pajamas David put out on the bed. “You know,” he says as he unbuttons his dress shirt, “I thought we had at least thirty years before one of us had to deal with dressing and undressing the other.”

“Mmmh, honey, I hate to break it to you, but I’ve been undressing you for five years now.” David takes Patrick’s shirt to hang it up before returning to the bed to fold the undershirt he’s just pulled over his head.

“Well, at least you’re not helping me put on my pajamas.”

“Would that be a dealbreaker?”

“At age thirty-six? Yeah, it’d be a dealbreaker.”

“That’s a stupid dealbreaker.”

“Is it?”

“Mmmh.”

“Why?”

David pauses in the process of folding Patrick’s pants before finishing them and putting them away with the undershirt. “Sometimes,” he says slowly, walking toward the bed and pushing against Patrick’s shoulder so he falls back against it, “You’re just asking to be babied.”

“ _I’m_ asking to be babied?” Patrick’s voice is incredulous as he pulls the sheets over himself, lying back against the pillows. David hums in response, pulling out his own pajamas. “You’re joining me?”

“A far too early bedtime to avoid social interaction? Yeah, I’m joining you.” Patrick grins at him sleepily in response, watching quietly as David changes.

“So I’m asking to be babied, huh,” Patrick says when David has pulled the curtains shut and turned off the lights.

“Well, not with your words, obviously.”

“Oh, is that obvious?”

“Don’t be facetious,” David says, crawling into bed beside him. There’s a pause and then: “You’d never ask to be taken care of.”

Patrick doesn’t respond to that and it’s too dark for David to understand his expression with him facing the ceiling, fingers laced across his chest. “You do it anyway,” he says finally.

David is taken aback. “Well, yeah,” he says, stumbling over his words. “You do the same for me.”

He turns on his side to face David, brow knit. “You make it easier. For yourself. To be cared for.”

“I’m not entirely sure that’s a compliment.”

“David.” Patrick is serious now, one hand on David’s hip. “Thank you.”

“Oh.” David doesn’t pretend to mask the surprise on his face in the dark.

“Really,” Patrick says, and then he’s moving in bed, his back to David, but curled into him. He drags David’s arm over his body, holds his hand just over his chest. “Thank you for today.”

David takes a while to speak next, waiting for his voice to stabilize. “Always.”

And then Patrick sleeps.

* * *

Patrick isn’t beside him when his alarm goes off the next morning. The room is entirely cleaned of any evidence that they stayed there, save for the outfit David set out last night. Their suitcases are both by the door, Patrick’s jacket thrown over his. He’s even placed David’s toilet kit beside it, open so that he can do his skincare and brush his teeth before packing it all up.

He can hear hushed voices in the kitchen downstairs, so he takes his time dressing, spends more time on his routine than he might have considering they have to make it back to the store before they’re supposed to open. They have an hour until they have to leave anyway and David isn’t about to cut into that time.

When he does make it downstairs, he runs into Clint, who looks bleary-eyed, holding a cup of coffee. “‘Morning, David,” he says, trying for brightness. He looks exhausted and David wonders if he spent the night beside Marcy waiting until her breath slowed to make sure she actually slept like he did with Patrick. “Did you sleep okay?”

David grimaces. “As well as we could,” he replies and Clint nods. He’s quieter than Marcy and hasn’t gotten in the habit of talking to David without Patrick as she has. He can still hear their lowered voices in the kitchen, so he blindly searches for any conversation topic. “I um. Stripped the bed. But I wasn’t sure where to put the sheets?”

“Oh, just leave them on the bed, I’ll do laundry this afternoon. Thank you for doing that.”

He ducks his head, worrying his lip. It wasn’t instinct. He had stood in the center of the room for a few long minutes, looking from their bags, to the empty cabinet, to the cleaned ensuite bathroom, and wavered. He knew, from some vague idea of cultural expectation, that he should do more, as a guest in his in-laws' house. But he stood there for several minutes too long, trying to force his brain to come up with anything to help out. Finally, he looked at the bed and decided stripping it might be helpful, maybe even doing a load of laundry. He wished his parents had a house like this, a house with a guest room and a laundry machine so that he could watch Patrick know what to do when they visited there. 

“It was no problem,” he replies and Clint puts a hand on his arm, smiling before passing him up the stairs. David hesitates at the bottom, shuffling his feet.

“You can go in,” Clint says from the top, eyes flickering toward the kitchen. “I think they’re done.”

“Thanks.” It comes out more like a relieved sigh and David pulls his lips into a tentative smile before Clint disappears down the hall.

Patrick, surprisingly, is still in his pajamas, resting his forearms on the kitchen island. He’s facing away from the door, toward his mom on the other side, who is seated on one of the stools and holding a cup of tea. She looks up when David enters, immediately standing. “David! Would you like some tea?”

Patrick turns, the tight lines in his face softening at the side of David. He straightens and leans his hip against the counter, craning his neck toward David to kiss his cheek.

“Oh, no, thank you, Mrs. Brewer.” She doesn’t bother telling him to call her Marcy for the fiftieth time, maybe too tired to do so. “Hi.”

“Hey.” Patrick winds himself around David’s waist and David drapes an arm over his shoulders, resting his temple against his. “Can I get you some coffee?”

“Later,” David says quietly, seeing Marcy out of the corner of his eye busying herself at the sink. Patrick turns his head and nudges his nose against David’s jaw as if he would if they woke up together. “Please tell me you slept at least a little last night.”

Patrick’s eyes are closed but his lips twitch into a smile. “Enough that I can drive us home,” he says.

“Absolutely not,” David says, loud enough that a laugh bubbles out of Marcy, unbidden. Patrick’s grin widens, gaze flickering to his mom, who is still facing away from them, pretending she can’t overhear their conversation. “There is _no way_ you are driving us home. How many hours of sleep did you get last night?”

“Definitely at least two.” His voice is light, teasing, and if Marcy wasn’t in the room, David would call him out on it. He fixes him with a look instead, an attempt at something that says _I’m not amused_. Even if David doubts it looks anything like what he intended, Patrick’s grin softens into something more fondly serious. “Really. I’m fine.”

“Mmmh, okay, tell that to the bags under your eyes.”

“Nothing a little eye serum can’t fix.” Patrick shrugs, as if that’s any sort of healthy solution.

“I wasn’t aware that eye serum fixed sleep deprivation?” David tilts his head to the side, raising one, challenging eyebrow. Patrick unwraps himself from David, reaching for his cup of tea.

“Neither was I.” Marcy is facing them now, wiping her hands on a dishtowel and leaning back against the sink. “David, could you recommend one that does, it would do wonders for Clint.”

“Oh, absolutely I will, just once Patrick tells us which magical eye serum he’s talking about?” He turns back to Patrick, victorious.

“Wish I could go back in the closet so _this_ wasn’t happening,” Patrick mutters into his mug, eyes dancing. Marcy has turned the tap back on, the rush of water too loud for her to hear Patrick’s quip, but David does, choking out a laugh and shooting Patrick an irritated look when Marcy turns at the sound.

“Everything okay?” she asks, eyes full of concern.

“Everything’s fine, Mom.” Patrick sips his tea, hiding his grin behind it and pointedly ignoring David’s glare. She frowns at him, like she knows better than to believe that coming from her son, but turns back to the sink anyway.

They spend the rest of the hour eating the eggs and bacon Clint has made, the four of them at the kitchen counter on stools, too tired to set the table. Marcy gives him extra bacon, stealing it off Clint’s plate. Patrick goes quiet again, like he keeps forgetting why they’re there, and David sees his parents exchange more than one look throughout breakfast.

They push them toward the door before they have a chance to help with dishes, piling their bags into the car and murmuring about getting back to the store in time. No one will care if they open late that morning, but Patrick’s parents fuss anyway. Clint closes the trunk and walks over to them just as Marcy takes Patrick’s hands in hers. It’s a private moment, David thinks, so he gets into the car and pretends to look busy texting Stevie. He doesn’t hear a word they say, but sees Marcy pull him down for a hug, pressing wet kisses to his cheeks. Clint wraps his arms around them both and then it’s the three of them standing in their driveway, tangled together.

When Patrick pulls away, Marcy taps on the window, making David jump. Clint angles his head, gesturing at him to get out of the car. The moment he does, Marcy opens her arms, letting David walk into them. David has lost track of the number of times they’ve visited the Brewers and been visited in return; he’s never been hugged as many times as this trip. 

Patrick gets into the passenger seat easily and starts to tell David about the rest of the week as they pull out of the driveway, the things that need to be done at the store, that he’ll be coming back for the weekend to help his mom with his grandma’s things, as if they haven’t already talked about it all, as if David hadn’t listened patiently as Patrick scheduled out every hour. 

He pulls out the calendar on his phone and David just listens, one hand on the wheel, one hand encased in Patrick’s. They'll talk later. He knows they will. For now, Patrick can plan.

**Author's Note:**

> you can find me on tumblr at [brewerspatrick](http://www.brewerspatrick.tumblr.com).


End file.
